


Brothers, Heroes, and Ghosts of Kisses

by Randomblackberry



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Angst, Child Abuse, Glenn is sibling goals Miklan is not, M/M, Sorry had to use my new favourite tag, Sylvix Week 2019, is it angsty who knows, no beta we die like Glenn, rushed as hell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-20
Updated: 2019-10-20
Packaged: 2020-12-27 05:16:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21113294
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Randomblackberry/pseuds/Randomblackberry
Summary: Sylvain Jose Gautier used to think he didn’t have the right to live his life freely.He doesn’t think that anymore.Sylvix week day 7/8: Family/ Free day





	Brothers, Heroes, and Ghosts of Kisses

**Author's Note:**

> Realised it was Sylvix week halfway through the actual week (rip) tried to do a prompt for family ran out of time, chopped off three thousand words off the end and submitted as free day instead. Life is truly cruel.

Sylvain had never thought of his birth family as his real family. They were nothing like the families captured in the leather bound fairytales Glenn used to read to them, stories about loving mothers and strict but proud fathers.

He supposed one could call his mother loving. She’d doted on him, especially in his youth, but as he’d grown older this care and affection faded. It was as if she’d been happy with him only because it meant she wouldn’t be expected to bear anymore children. She could go forth and live a cushy life as a noble lady of a noble house, all thanks to the blessing (curse?) of Sylvain’s blood.

And his father, he was proud of Sylvain, in a twisted way. But then again, short of Sylvain refusing to sire a heir, or dying pathetically on the battlefield Sylvain didn’t know how his father could not be. After all, as long as Sylvain married a noble woman and produced a crested child, their bloodline would continue. There was very little way he could mess this up. His father could be disappointed in him-he was, constantly, but he would never disown him. He couldn’t afford to.

This revelation made Sylvain bolder. He would never gain his father’s approval, but in the same vein, could never screw up badly enough to be stripped of his noble title. There was a middle ground to operate in there, somewhere, so that’s what Sylvain did.

Realistically Sylvain would never be allowed to marry a commonor. Realistically Sylvain wouldn’t even have a choice. He could take a lover, discreetly, after the birth of an heir, he knew that’s what both of his parents did for a time, but it would always be hidden. Dirty. Unofficial.

Not that Sylvain particularly minded. He didn’t want any of the random girls, commoner or noble-to be part of his family anyways.

-/-/-/-/-/

His first friend was Glenn. Relations were close between the noble houses of Fraldarius and Gautier, and so Sylvain was a mere dribbling toddler when he met Glenn for the first time, not that he remembered. Apparently he’d followed Glenn everywhere those first few years before and after Felix was born. Glenn was the big brother Sylvain sorely needed. He was nothing like Miklan, who even at a young age was bitter and cold to Sylvain. Glenn was bold and mischievous, but he was never cruel, and Sylvain felt safer watching him wave around a practice sword than he did with his own parents. 

The two were present to see the new Prince Dimitri, although Sylvain had been too busy tugging on Glenn’s fancy dress pants and begging to go play to join in with everyone cooing at the royal baby. Altercations with Sreng worsened after Prince Dimitri’s birth, and so Sylvain didn’t see Glenn very much in the three years following.

But when Sylvain was seven and Glenn ten, he met Felix Hugo Fraldarius for the first time. Felix was a crybaby. A pathetic, snotty nosed crybaby. He cried about everything, his brother refusing to carry him, Sylvain refusing to play with him. He was prone to screaming at Count Galatea’s daughter Ingrid and then instantly bursting into tears afterwards as if he’d been the one verbally abused. He was, to put it simply, a handful.

And yet Sylvain could see the way his father eyed the Fraldarius family with envy, even back then. Felix had a major crest, a rarity in those times, even for a strong bloodline like the Fraldarius one. And although Glenn possessed a minor one like Sylvain himself, he imagined that if the Margrave was their father he’d make Felix the heir instead. He was always one to view crests over age, crests over experience, crests over basic human decency. He was jealous just thinking about all the crested children Felix and Glenn could help bring into the Fraldarius family-far more than Sylvain and House Gautier’s weakening bloodline could manage.

Sylvain found himself taking on the sort of big brother role Glenn had had as they grew older, him and Felix and Dimitri and Ingrid. Glenn was always busy with training, with etiquette, with everything that came with being a noble heir. Eventually that too would be Sylvain, so when he was ten and the little babies seven, he alternated between terrorising the trio and batting his little eyelashes at every woman he came across.

It got him candy. Pats on the head. Coos of approval and acknowledgment he’d never get from his own mother and father. He was a cute boy, and likely to grow up as handsome too, so he turned up the charm at a young age as soon as he realised that not only did it get him what he wanted, he enjoyed it. There was kind of a power involved in stringing along people with his doeful eyes at his own whim and leisure. It extended to compliments, until he grew bolder, more brazen, until he was practically propositioning people on the street,

Silly, baby Felix didn’t understand. He didn’t get women, didn’t like them, not like Sylvain did. He was fond of kicking Sylvain whenever he saw him trying to seduce his latest victim. Even though he was still small he was strong, and more than willing to beat at Sylvain with his furious little fists until he promised to stop his ways. He didn’t really understand why it bothered him so much, but every time Felix caught him with a girl and punished him this way, Sylvain waited a little bit longer before going out for his next catch.

“Are you jealous, Felix?” he teased, after Felix’s third consecutive attempt to foil Sylvain’s romantic relations. “You’re never going to get any girls with that pouty face,”

Felix’s aforementioned face was accompanied with puffed up cheeks and tightly crossed arms. “I don’t want girls. Girls are gross!”

Next to him Ingrid scowled. Even at such a young age her stern demeanour was emerging, and at her most serious could intimidate even Glenn. “Hey!”

“Kissing girls is gross,” Felix amended. Ingrid nodded, seemingly satisfied.

“You know why you don’t understand, Felix? Because you’re a baby,”

Felix went scarlet. “I-I’m not a baby!”

Sylvain just nodded sagely. “You totally are. Look at Dimitri, he’s gone and got himself a girlfriend!” he frowned. “Not that he’ll let us meet her,”

“She probably doesn’t even exist,” Felix said darkly. “I hope she doesn’t,”

“That’s not a very knightly thing to say,” Ingrid chided. Her father had made the grave mistake of reading to her Loog and the Maiden of Wind, just a couple of months ago. It had instilled in her an absolute fascination with knighthood and chivalry. It seemed like these days all she wanted to do was trail behind Glenn and ask him questions about knighthood. It was good that they got along, Sylvain supposed. They were engaged to be married, not that Ingrid understood the proper implications of that just yet.

“I don’t care!” Felix proclaimed boldly. “I hate knights!”

Ingrid gasped, suitably scandalised, but Sylvain intervened before she could beat Felix to a bloody pulp, separating the two of them none too gently.

“I thought you loved knights, Felix? Where’s this coming from?”

Felix mumbled something. Sylvain could just about make Glenn’s name.

“You’re not a baby anymore, Felix,” he groaned, more than a little frustrated. “Did you and Glenn get in another fight?”

Felix turned scarlet. His little fists tightened at his sides. “No,” he growled out, before his shoulders slumped. “Its not like he’s ever around anyways,”

Struck by realisation, Sylvain allowed a massive smile to overtake his face. “Are you lonely, Felix? You really are a baby,”

“Shut up!” 

Sylvain did not shut up. In fact he got even louder. “You’re a baby!” he bent down and spread his arms wide in a mockery of a hug. “Don’t be lonely-I’m here!”

“S-Shut up!” Felix screeched again, but his fingers grasped onto Sylvain’s sleeve, which was basically acceptance.

“Glenn is busy training to be a knight,” Ingrid parroted wisely. “You’ll see him soon, when he’s serving the royal family,”

Felix, ever the crybaby, sniffled. Sylvain didn’t even know when the boy had started laughing. “He...he’s pretty cool,” he admitted, and Sylvain laughed.

“He is isn’t he? Your brother is a really cool guy,” 

-/-/-/-/-/

More than once Sylvain wished Glenn was his brother. By the time Sylvain turned nine years old Miklan’s petty hatred towards Sylvain had morphed into something far more violent and disturbing. What started as snide comments and shoves in the hallway morphed into death threats which morphed into actual attempts at carrying out said threats.

Which led to the well. 

Sylvain doesn’t remember much of the well. He just remembered how cold it was, how sharp the stones felt against his back. He remembered two similar faces, Felix and the older Glenn, both twisted in expressions of disbelief and panic.

He remembered Felix refusing to leave him even after he’d been discharged by the infirmary, wrapping his surprisingly strong arms around him and not letting go.

“You can’t die,” he said fiercely. “You can’t,”

Any other day Sylvain would have responded in a more amused manner. He would have teased Felix for clinging to him and showing so much concern. But in truth he was scared, shaken. Miklan was still around, his brother’s threat hanging right over his head. Felix’s eyes were wide, so so wide and hurt and pleading. They were both absolutely scared out of their wits,

“No,” Sylvain agreed, in a voice that shook with every breath. “I can’t. And neither can you,”

“I can’t imagine...” Felix trailed off. He paused for a moment, before working up the courage to continue. “I can’t imagine dying without you,”

It was a heavy thing for a boy not yet eight to say. But Felix could already wield a sword with startling proficiency, and his father had slain many an enemy of the king. To the Fraldarius family, death was no stranger. Felix didn’t fear death. He feared dying alone.

“You won’t have to,” Sylvain whispered. It felt like a secret, something to be kept away from prying ears. 

“Promise?” and like the seven year old he was, Felix offered his pinky with the seriousness of somebody about to sign a legitimate business contraction. He looked so innocent, cheeks gleaming with moisture, eyes watering with tears not yet shed.

“I promise,”

Glenn sparred with Miklan two days later. The former took decided relish in laying Miklan out flat on his ass. Miklan was maybe a little more beaten up than simple training warranted, but neither Sylvain nor Felix were about to expose Glenn-not like Sylvain’s father would have honestly cared about Miklan sustaining injury enough besides.

Glenn was like a hero to Sylvain. The week he stayed at the Gautier estate, Miklan didn’t touch Sylvain. Not once.

-/-/-/-/

Sylvain could claim that it was Glenn’s death that changed Felix, but in truth it was something else entirely. After Glenn’s death Felix was quieter, yes. and the relationship between Felix and his father grew uncomfortable and strange. Suddenly entrusted with the future of his noble house Felix underwent intense dimplomatic training just weeks after Glenn died. As a result after the funeral it was two years until Sylvain saw Felix again.

Sylvain almost didn’t recognise him. Glenn had liked to wear his hair out long, in a ponytail or plait. Felix seemed to very deliberately wear it differently, gathering the long strands into a messy bun. The years had been kind on him, appearance wise. No longer did Sylvain look upon him and see a crying, attention seeking toddler, instead he was the beginnings of a very very attractive young man. A very very attractive man who did very very strange things to Sylvain’s heart.

Personality wise was where Felix’s biggest changes had taken place. Gone was the way he clung to Sylvain with big, pleading eyes. Gone too was the bounce in his step and the quirk of his lips-they were now stuck in a seemingly permanent frown. He didn’t talk much with Sylvain, he only made stilted small talk and insulted his lack of training.

But if he treated Sylvain with disinterest, he treated Dimitri with pure, unfiltered contempt. Sylvain remembered vividly his surprise at when Dimitri, who at a time was Felix’s favourite individual behind his brother had walked through the door, only to be verbally accosted by a raging Felix. The prince in question, had paled, but hadn’t tried to confirm or deny the outrageous claims being slung his way. The only one willing to try salvage Dimitri’s honour was Dedue, the soft spoken tall giant Dimitri had saved from Duscur that seemed to accompany him on every step. When he spoke in Dimitri’s defence Felix whirled on him, hurling abuse and accusations even more horrid than what he’d said to Dimitri.

Sylvain meant to stop him, he really did, but Felix stormed off before giving anybody a chance to react. Sylvain tried, more than once to ask Dimitri what had happened. But the prince, one of his oldest, truest friends, never blessed him with a full response. They’d had a disagreement, Dimitri told him. A disagreement so dire it led to Felix calling his once best friend a rabid beast?

At first Sylvain thought it was related to Glenn’s death, as everything seemed to be those days. But no, although things had been awkward between Dimitri and Felix after the tragedy of Duscur, that had been just because they were mourning. This open hostility...it was wrong.

But throughout Dimitri and Felix’s visit to Gautier territory, the two’s ‘disagreement’ was never straightened out. Sylvain found himself having to talk to them separately. He’d catch breakfast with a subdued Dimitri, before skipping to the training grounds to try and fail to convince a destructive Felix to pick up girls with him. It never worked, but it meant he got to see Felix in action, and sometimes, if Sylvain played his cards right, see him smile.

In truth Felix hadn’t changed that much at all. His relationship with Dimitri differed greatly, and he kept his emotions much closer to his chest, but for someone like Sylvain, who’d known Felix for years and years he could see flickers of the old, gentle Felix forcibly hidden by his new, harsh exterior. It was comforting to see that at Felix’s core he was still the same.

Although the two weeks Dimitri and Felix spent at the estate were confusing ones, Sylvain found himself enjoying them. Even though his friends had changed, having them was still better than walking around the manor alone, his brother looming over him like a dark spectre. He wouldn’t dare do anything to him while the actual prince was present. Or at least that’s what Sylvain thought.

Miklan caught him on the way to the training hall, gripped him right by the shoulders and slammed him so hard into the wall he saw stars.

“Hey, Sylv,” that was what Felix used to call him, back when he was a snotty nosed brat who couldn’t even pronounce his name right. “Don’t you want to train with me?”

Sylvain swallowed back his urge to accept. This was nothing like the way Felix would push or poke at him. It was nothing like how Ingrid would slap him around the head for skipping training to to chat with girls. Miklan’s idea of training was probably twenty times more violent. 

But yet...

“Are you deaf as well as dumb?” Miklan wondered aloud. A smirk was growing on his face, an ugly vindictive sneer that sent shivers down Sylvain’s spine. “A good for nothing as a heir, huh? Looks like the only thing you’re good for is your crest and nothing else,”

Miklan was tall, yes, but he regularly skimped on training, relying more on brute force to enclose his victims (read: Sylvain) . Sylvain was on the lanky side, still growing, but the difference wasn’t what it once was. Sylvain trained to get out of holds every other day. Miklan hadn’t even hit him yet. All he was doing was holding Sylvain’s shoulder tight enough to bruise. He should be able to get away easily.

But thoughts of escape dwindle and fade when Miklan hit him hard, right across the cheek. Sylvain’s first panicked thought was how he’d cover the bruise that would surely blossom there, until Miklan’s grip tightened on his shoulder and let him know there were more important, more present, things to know about.

Miklan pushed him roughly to the ground, slamming him face first onto the polished marble floor. His chin smarted where it hit at an angle, and Sylvain knew that if he could muster up the energy to bring his hands up to check it he’d find it steadily bleeding.

Sylvain’s flight instinct was starting to kick in and override his martyr tendencies, but although he attempted to kick out he was much too late. Miklan’s foot came hard down on his ribs. Sylvain imagined he could hear the snap of them breaking, but he was too numb to feel it.

“I was too much of a coward to kill you when I should have. I was too scared of our dear old dad throwing me out into the cold. But now, well, I’ve been talking to some people. They need leadership, you know. Proper, strong leadership based on battle prowess, not stupid bloodlines. So, let him throw me out. At least away from this house I’ll be respected.“ Miklan laughed, a harsh, ugly sound. “It’ll give our family a terrible reputation if their oldest son is disowned. I can’t think of a better way to punish you all,”

“Miklan...” Sylvain whined, wincing as Miklan dug his foot in deeper, resulting in sharp pain shooting through his spine seemingly without end. “Stop...”

“Short of killing you, of course,” Miklan rummaged in his back pocket and revealed the silver glint of a wickedly sharp knife. “Tell me, will our family still value you so much if your precious silver tongue is gone?” 

He bent down, wielding the sharp edge, and Sylvain, as if realising the gravity of the situation for the first time, opened his mouth and screamed-

A small bundle crashed into Miklan, taking the unsuspecting man off balance. Then, before he could react with much more than an angered snarl the figure moved again, hitting him at just the right angle to knock him cleanly out.

The figure, of course, was Felix.

Sylvain could see him from his spot on the ground. His saviour is glistening from head to toe from sweat. He’d obviously been training before he’d burst in, probably coaxed by Sylvain’s scream. His expression was angrier than Sylvain had ever seen it, even more so than when he’d met Dimitri outside of the estate. He was breathing heavily, shoulders rising and falling with the adrenaline of the attack. He poked Miklan, slumped against the wall, with his toe. He didn’t move but the rise and fall of his chest proved that he still lived.

Felix turned to him, and Sylvain, very much in pain, was suddenly very very ashamed.

He was overcome with a sudden need to explain himself. To write off his injuries, even though he could barely prop himself up on his elbows to look Felix in the eye. He need to say something.

“My hero,” is what he ended up saying, before promptly passing out.

-/-/-/-/-/-/

“I told the Margrave what Miklan did to you,” those are the first words Sylvain woke up to. Felix was sitting on a stool by his bed, fingers laced in a steeple underneath his chin. “He’s throwing him out. Personally I think banishment is too good for him, but I know you’d be upset if I killed him. Although I can’t fathom why,”

Sylvain was in his bedroom, which was strange. He’d expected to wake up in the infirmary. His ribs ached when he shifted, which wasn’t strange, but a quick glance in the mirror revealed that the bruise across his cheek was fading, turning a soft green, not the angry bright purple he’d been expecting.

“You were unconscious for three days,” Felix announced bluntly.

“Oh,” Sylvain said, before Felix’s past words caught up to him. “Miklan got-“

Felix jumped off of his stool, which fell to the ground with a resounding clang. He leans forward, so their noses were close enough to touch. His eyes were terrifying, dark, cold and betrayed.

“You promised,” he seethed. “You promised not to die, and what do I find you doing?”

Sylvain can’t meet Felix’s gaze head on so he ducks his head. The shame hadn’t quite caught up to him yet. He was still dizzy from having just woken up.

“I wasn’t trying to die,” he argued, because it was true. Sylvain had been going down the hall to see Felix. To train with him, talk with him, maybe even see him smile. Running into Miklan had never been part of the equation.

However Felix just looked enraged at his response. “You know how much he hates you. He wanted to murder you, Sylvain. For years he’s wanted to kill you. By never telling anyone what he did to you, by constantly surviving by sheer luck and your own stupidity, you keep leaving yourself open to-“

This time it was Sylvain’s turn to bring their faces together. He dared to lift his eyes to meet Felix’s. The Fraldarius heir’ were glimmering with angry, vindictive tears. This was the Felix that had clung to Sylvain after Miklan had pushed him in the well. The very same one.

“I’m here now. It’s fine. Miklan’s gone,” that last part was hard to swallow, it stuck out in his throat like glass. “He’s gone,”

Felix pulled back, quickly regaining his composure. “Good riddance,” he scoffed. He didn’t waste a second comforting Sylvain. After being smothered so long in false compliments and platitudes it was a comfort in itself.

Sylvain remembered what Miklan had said. He had people on the outside. He would be okay. Happier, even, than how he was as a noble child. Even so, regret clung to his every core. Regret at the proverbial loss of a brother. He’d lost someone who would ruffle his hair after he’d hit the target dead centre, someone who’d teach him how to cook and hunt and speak. Miklan may not have done any of those things, may never have, but the thought of him coming around, to becoming a good brother and truly loving Sylvain...

Well, it was a little hard to deal with. It felt like he’d lost family, no matter how unfamiliar they’d acted.

“You’re like Glenn,” he ended up saying instead of voicing these thoughts.

Felix recoiled. “What?”

Too tired to be embarrassed, Sylvain smiled. “You both saved me,”

“Idiot,” Felix grumbled lowly, as Sylvain succumbed to sleep once more. “Save yourself next time,” 

Sylvain thought he might have felt the ghostly feeling of lips pressing against his forehead before he went properly to sleep, but he couldn’t tell. What he did know was that Felix’s hand was entwined around his, and it stayed there until he next woke up.

**Author's Note:**

> After the war Sylvain married into the Fraldarius family. In the early years of their marriage Felix and Sylvain spent many years apart, with Sylvain travelling back and forth from Sreng to Fraldarius in an attempt to improve relations. Eventually he succeeded, allowing Felix and Sylvain to relax, handing off claim to their respective houses to younger relatives. They were said to never truly settle down, working as knights to the King one day and mercenaries the next. Still, despite the clear chaos of their married life, witnesses claimed they loved each other very much, enough so that in the end they passed away on the very same day, as if conceding that one could not bear to live without the other


End file.
